M1, NGC1952, Crab Nebula

About this image

About this image
This is a color composite formed from two images of the well-known Crab
Nebula, taken on the night of October 27th 1995
with the NOAO/STIS/Tektronix 2048x2048 CCD detector on the 3.5-meter
WIYN telescope.
At the focal plane of the WIYN, this detector has a
sampling scale of 0.2 arc seconds per pixel.
This picture shows the full imaging power of the WIYN telescope:
the "seeing", or image size, is about 0.6 arc seconds, or
about twice the resolution of typical ground-based images.
Some shell-like features in the center of the nebula, and the
subtle filamentary structure evident throughout the region, are impossible
to see in fuzzier (that is, more typical) pictures.
Image processing
can reveal even more detail.

About this object
The Crab Nebula was originally given this name due to its resemblance to a
crab's claw in an early sketch made in 1855 by Lord Rosse's staff
astronomer R.J. Mitchell. It is the remnant of a supernova explosion in
the year 1054 A.D., which was recorded in five separate accounts in the
Far East, although, oddly, no western observation has survived.
The nebula was probably first noticed in 1731 by John Bevis, and it was
significant enough to be the first entry in Charles Messier's list of
nebulae (compiled to avoid mistaking them for comets).
The nebula continues to expand and change the details of its appearance,
and this is partly due to the violence of the original explosion.
However, the star which exploded left behind a rotating neutron star,
which continues to beam energy out into the nebula, as well as
flashing with a period of only 33 milliseconds.
The details of this energy input are important for our understanding both
of neutron stars and of the physical conditions in the nebula, and are
revealed in the patterns of filaments, their brightness and colors, and
the way they change with time.